Digital photos

[StaceyMom]

I was looking into buying the CD for our pictures on the Oasis. It says it is 50% off when you buy before cruise but it is 349. That seems steep. Does anyone remember the price on ship? Anyone done this and would you recommend?

[nottooshabby]

We went for spring break and it was $399 on the ship and $349 on their website before the cruise. This was the third time we have done the CD. Each time it has gotten worse. This latest time they have added the ship name to all the pictures and some of the backgrounds were scratched up which was easily visible in the pictures. Not to mention how they compress the pictures and reduce the image quality.

 

 

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Edited June 20, 2014 by nottooshabby

[StaceyMom]

So you dont think it is worth it? The price seems steep. I could have swore I paid 199 three years ago.

[Host Jacquelyn]

I think I paid $299 for our week on Freedom, maybe $349. It was not even offered on the ship, anyone who wanted it was out of luck. They were having problems with the process and agreed to honor those that prepaid it but would not sell any other packages, so we were very happy we prepaid. Keep in mind, the Terms and Conditions say you can cancel and get a refund any time prior to picking up the CD. So, if you do not like the pix, in theory you can get a refund. I say "in theory" as sometimes those onboard are not familiar with the official T&Cs.....

[m*u*g*]

The CD + Prints was $449 before, $499 on board or something close to this. I beleive the CD only was $349 before and $399 on board.

 

Oasis 10/13

 

If a larger family (4 or more) is it worth it if you like taking photos. Seeing that prints are $20+ each.

 

25 photos puts you close to that #.

Edited June 20, 2014 by m*u*g*

[nottooshabby]

So you dont think it is worth it? The price seems steep. I could have swore I paid 199 three years ago.

 

We paid $199 on Freedom 3 years ago. Then on freedom a year later it was $249. Our last cruise on Allure, even buying it ahead of time it was $349.

 

Is it worth it? Well it depends. It was worth it the first time. The images were high quality without all the RC branding all over the pictures. The 2nd and 3rd time the images were heavily compressed. Images with a resolution of 3000x2000(about, just going off memory) were less than 1MB in size whereas the first time at the same resolution they were 3-4MB each. The only way to accomplish the small file size with that high resolution is to compress the images heavily. The compression causes skin tones to look blotchy as similar colors are merged into one.

 

The second time we bought the cd it was only the dining room pictures that had a RC border around them. The third time even the pictures taken with the photographers out in the main promenade had the ship name added to the bottom of the picture. Next time I'm not sure I will spend the money on it. If you do it, take a lot of pictures. Visit one or two photographers stations every night. I think we ended up with over 100 pictures, with maybe 20 being decent.

[StaceyMom]

You know now that you mentioned it I was looking at my old CD, the hair color is off. All my kids' hair look the wrong color- very dark. Hmm..maybe I should just buy the pics I want

[secret1122]

I just paid $349 on board the Allure last month. I'm interested in the fact that others are commenting on the boarders and templates being added to the photos. I'm currently dealing with the company that does the photos because mine had the same thing. My 8x10 photos on the ship had nothing added to them. I purchased the CD, and once I got it home and downloaded the photos, they all had the name of the ship imprinted across them, and the photos from the dining venues had huge boarders around them to where the actual photo only covered about half of the full frame of the shot.

 

I am asking the company that produces the photos to allow me access to my unaltered photos as I saw them on the ship. They claim that the signage tells us that the photos may have boarders or templates as seen in the gallery or on the computer kiosk, but the problem is mine didn't show any of these versions on the ship, whether electronically, or in print. We have been going back and forth for about a month now.

 

As mentioned, the image sizes are fairly small now, and even the paperwork with the CD says you'll only be able to get a quality 8x10 out of them. Basically we are now getting lower quality prints, with advertising printed right on the photos, and we're paying hundreds of dollars for these. I don't think this is right.

[palofmine]

I purchase our embarkation photo, that'd it. I use my ipad and water camera for the rest, then use Instagram to put them all together, i always ask other passengers to take our pictures and they come out great.

[ckfred]

The only photos I buy are ones of our son with some sort of character, because he knows how to mug for the camera.

 

On our last cruise, my wife and I had a formal portrait, and we weren't at all happy. So, we didn't buy any pictures.

 

I'm always curious as to the experience of ship photographers. Clearly, they are taking a lot of pictures and don't have time to get every group in a perfect pose. But, it seems to me that some ship photographers aren't much better than my mother with a Kodak Hawkeye Instamatic using 126 film.